Ministry of Finance in an Effort to Consolidate International Assistance to Afghanistan

Eighteenth session of the Supervision and Solidarity of International Aid meeting was held on Tuesday in Kabul, attended by a number of donor countries to Afghanistan.

The purpose of the meeting was to share documents of collaboration of partner countries with regards to the infrastructure development of Afghanistan that will be presented at the Tokyo Conference, said H.E. Hazrat Omar Zakhilwal.

Discussions on establishing good governance, creating a field of sustainable business, supporting and strengthening local institutions of urban management program was part of the agenda for the meeting. These points will most likely be raised at the Tokyo Conference as well.

Main Habibi, Head of Strategic Policy Implementation of the Ministry of Finance, emphasized that any development programs undertaken by Afghan government must first be approved by the donor institution.

At the ‘Heart of Asia’ conference so far 11 development programs have been approved. Five other programs named ‘Towards Self-Sufficiency’ are taken into consideration for discussion at the Supervision and Solidarity of International aid meeting.

Minister Zakhilwal called on the partner countries at the meeting to carry out at least 50% of the projects after Tokyo Conference through the national budget.

Tokyo Conference will be hosted by Japan in July this year and more than 40 countries will participate. Representatives of the world’s industrialized countries will take decisions on the international community economic aid for rebuilding Afghanistan post 2015-2025, the period of transformation.

Some economic experts believe that aid money in Afghanistan has been misspent during all these years.

According to the experts, despite the billions of aid inflow significant changes in Afghanistan are not evident.